1. Field
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to techniques for improving the vibrational health of computer systems. More specifically, embodiments of the present invention relate to techniques for generating vibration profiles of one or more rotating cooling devices in a computer system.
2. Related Art
Computer systems, such as computer servers and storage arrays, can be adversely affected by mechanical vibrations of internal components and structures. In particular, certain rotational system components, such as cooling fans, air blowers and air movers, generate rotational vibrations during computer system operation. When operating at specific rotational frequencies (i.e., speeds), the rotational vibrations from cooling fans or air movers can excite the structural resonances of a chassis of a computer system, thereby causing destructive amplification of the rotational vibrations. The amplified rotational vibrations can cause performance degradation and reliability problems for interconnects, motors, and data storage devices, such as optical drives and hard-disk drives (HDDs). For example, HDDs are very sensitive to these rotational vibrations. Hence, excessive rotational vibrations can cause drastic degradation of read and/or write throughput performance of the HDDs.
Moreover, as computer system designs continue to incorporate more CPUs, memory, and storage into the same form factor, system designers are installing more cooling fans and are operating them at higher fan speeds to provide sufficient cooling to support the high performance operation. All of these factors cause higher rotational vibration levels inside the computer systems, which can be further aggravated by structural resonances of the chassis.
However, there typically exists no specification for the vibrational characteristics of these cooling devices, such as device housing resonances. Furthermore, vibrational characteristics can vary greatly from one cooling device to another. For example, it has been noticed that even two cooling fans of the same model and balanced by the same person can drastically differ in the amount of vibration they produce during operation. The lack of vibration profiles for the cooling devices makes it extremely difficult to meet vibrational health targets for computer systems, because designers have little control over the vibrations produced by these devices.
Hence, there is a need for a method and an apparatus that facilitates generating an accurate vibration profile of a rotational cooling device without the above-described problems.